Thursday, October 4, 2012

#12NovelsIn12Months Update: Apparently I Am Insane

I've had more that one person mention that my #12NovelsIn12Months project is crazy. People have wondered where I'll get the time for edits and revisions or anything else. I tried to indicate in my original postthat no, I am not insane, but I suppose it needs some clarification.

To achieve my goal, I have committed to writing 3,000 words per day. That's 21,000 words per week. Contrast this with, say Edmund Hillary summiting Mount Everest or Magellan setting off to circumnavigate the globe, and I hardly think my comparatively meager goal is anything remarkable. Will it take a lot of work? Yes. But not more work than anyone working 40 hours a week at any given job. Less, actually.

And I think that is the best way to approach this, the best way to keep myself on track: by putting it in perspective. I will spend 3-4 hours a day writing. If I write for 6 hours one day, I might be able to spend a little less time the next day, but I expect 3 or 4 to be the average. Suppose I sleep for 8 hours a day. That leaves me with a full 12 hours to do everything else. As mentioned before, right now I am able to focus on writing full-time. I realize that this project would be much more difficult if I were working full-time as well. And honestly, if I were working full-time, I probably wouldn't be doing this.

But it's not crazy, I won't be doing nothing but writing in my waking hours and I know that at the end of it I will have accomplished in a year what other writers may do in a decade. I can well afford 3-4 hours a day to see this done. The reason I am making this project public is because I now have an incentive to complete it. I now have other people encouraging me. If I fail I will not just let myself down, but I feel as though I will have let them down as well.

My total for the first three days: 10,296 words. I'm about 1,300 words ahead of schedule, which frees up a little time later in the month if I need it. I'm off to write my 3,000 words for today. The next update will probably be Monday to give you my total word count after the first full week.